More is More

Happy Monday!  When I got together with friends Lisa. Rachel and Jen last week we set up a little challenge to all make a card with the same image – a super cutie from Rachel’s stash – and post them all today.  Of course I didn’t get my card made until this morning and now I am rushing to get my post typed and published for the deadline.  I mean, gosh, I only had a week to get this done!

Love the way my card turned out.  I used Jen del Muro’s SFYTT and Echo Park papers I got from TE.  Carstock colors are all SU – Blushing Bride, Wild Wasabi and Early Espresso.

Image was colored with copics and I added stickles as well as lots of Taylor’s Tiny Twinkles.

(ETA: Links above have been added now.  🙂 )

Dying to see what the other girls have done with this image.  Let’s go check it out:  Lisa, Rachel, Jen.

Thanks for stopping by!  My main goal for today will be to stay cool.  The forcast is 107!  YUCK!!

-Jami

Happy Friday!  Last night I taught my monthly stamping class and we created journals and notebooks!  It was so much fun!  I took some photos of the girls projects and I will share them soon.  But for now, it’s time for the Taylored Expressions Sketch Challenge.  I was super excited when I saw this had a circle for the focal point because I just received the TE September Key Ingredients and I was dying to use one of the doily transparencies!  I honestly think this is one of the most beautiful KI Kits EVER!!!

I have to ask you to bear with me on this post.  The SCS Blogs just went through a huge upgrade and everything is different – not the best time to be typing a post at midnight when I’m totally exhausted.  I’m sure I’ll be able to figure things out when I’m more alert, but at this point I’ll be happy to just get my card published for you to see!

I have a lovely photo of the copics and inks I used, but I can’t seem to get it added into this post.  Sorry.  I’ll try to play with this some more and edit later after some sleep.

Image and sentiment are Elzybells (the little ones sold by A Muse).  Elzybells in England (the original larger images) is having a going out of business sale and I just noticed a banner ad on SCS that says they have stamps at 70% off!

Let’s see what the rest of the Sketch Crew has to show us today.

Thanks for stopping by.  Please let me know if anything looks weird.  Change is hard, but I’m sure I’ll love the upgrade once I get it figured out.

Happy Tuesday!  I’m excited to be participating in a fun Taylored Expressions Blog Hop today – Blast From the Past.  It’s so great to get to focus on some favorite sets even if they aren’t the very newest.  My card features Sprinkled with Love along with a sentiment from Sweet Occasions and it showcases the masking technique. I built the scene from front to back, masking with Eclipse tape as I went. Images were colored with Copics and I added accents of Ranger Glossy Accents, Espresso Dimensional Pearls, Red Stickles, Dazzling Diamonds Glitter, and even some little seed beads on the donut.  Just about all of the supplies are from the  Taylored Expressions Store.  The dp is Echo Park and it is oh so yummy on the Bazzill Chocolate Creme card base!

Recipe –

Stamps: Sprinkled with Love, Sweet Occasions

Paper: Echo Park, TE White, Bazzill Chocolate Creme

Ink: Memento Black, SU Crumbcake

Copics: E34, RV32, YG41, Y21, YG17, R14, R37, B52, BG72, C1

Other: Spellbinders Blossom and large Circles, Pom Pom trim, American Crafts ribbon, Red Stickles, Glossy Accents, espresso dimensional pearls, Kaisercraft chocolate pearls, seed beads, dazzling diamonds glitter.

Time to get hopping and see what everyone has created today!

Whether you are playing today or not we would love to have you join us for the October Hop which will focus on Christmas and Winter!  You can find all the details about how to sign up and how to play by clicking here.  AND in case you don’t already have a stamp set to use or if you’ve had your eye on a previous TE Christmas/Winter set You’re in luck!  From today through Sunday 9/26 TE is running a  special SALE  – the following select Christmas sets are 20% off!!!

Christmas Blessings
Season’s Sweetings
Home Sweet Home
Holiday Wonder
Wings of Joy
Tag Treats

I have to say that Christmas Blessings and Wings of Joy are two of my all-time favorite TE stamp sets! What a super sweet deal!  Thanks for stopping by.  Happy Hopping and Happy Shopping!!

Happy Monday!  I hope you had a wonderful weekend – I certainly did!  I had the opportunity to get together with some stampin’ buddies for the afternoon/evening on Saturday!  Jen Visser has been a friend for several years and fellow TESC Sketch Crew members Rachel Sztonyk and Lisa Hjulberg felt like old friends even though this was our first time to stamp together (in the same room as opposed to playing the sketch together.  LOL!)  We had a blast.  I had everything set up so they could try out the Cinch Machine and make a little notebook project.  Everyone brought images so we could stamp and take them home.  And of course we talked and talked and talked!

 Lisa, Jen. Rachel

Lisa, me & Tessa, Rachel

The Rocket Scientist was off to a family party celebrating the 16th birthday of an absolutely wonderful kid!  I told him Saturday morning that I would make a birthday card for him to take, but as the girls arrived I didn’t have it done yet.  TRS was in a hurry to get out the door so I needed to whip up something quick.  I don’t know about you, but I’m not very creative amongst a lot of chatter, not to mention time pressure.  I excused myself to my stamp room to put something together.  Anyone who knows me, knows that I cannot stand to be away from the action and out of the loop so I was super motivated to get this card done quickly.  I think I did it in less than 5 minutes – which really is beyond record time for me.  And I was actually super happy with how it turned out!  Wow!

I knew I wanted to use the TE set You’re My Hero because that’s my go-to for teenagers – especially boys. This young man is a drummer so the “ROCK” theme of the set was perfect, but I didn’t want to use any of the guitar images – so I just kept it super simple with a little distressing.

Colors are Old Olive, Ruby Red and Chocolate Chip.  Images stamped on TE Choice Buttercream cs.

Thanks for stopping by.  I’ll be back tomorrow with the Taylored Expressions Blast from the Past Blog Hop.  And that card definitely was NOT done in 5 minutes.  LOL!  Have a great day!

Happy Friday!  Time for another sketch challenge from Taylor – TESC128.  Everyone is welcome to play along  – Taylored Expressions stamps are NOT a requirement.  This is an easy and versatile sketch, but when I first saw it all I could think of was people sitting in a theater looking at a big movie screen.  I had to resist the urge to go with the obvious and create a card with Cuppie in the theater, so I started looking around at what else I might want to work with.  I just got a big Stampin’ Up order a couple of days ago. (yes, I still buy SU stuff) and realized that this silhouette image would work well with the sketch. Also I’ve been wanting to try the bouncing brayer technique that Baker’s Dozen member Charmaine Ikach does so beautifully.  Here’s what I came up with.

So often these Bethlehem scenes are done in blues, but I’m not much a blue person so I decided to go with purples instead. I used the Parfait SU Kaleidacolor pad (please tell me I’m not the only person with over a dozen of these K-pads – one of my original stamping obsessions – LOL!) along with Elegant Eggplant and Rich Razzleberry cardstock.  The image was heat embossed (black craft ink and clear ep) on shimmer white cs and black was used for matting.  Ribbon is Rich Razzleberry satin.  The Arbor border punch with Taylor’s Tiny Twinkles finish off the design.

Now let’s see what the rest of the Sketch Crew has in store for us today –

• Alice Wertz
• Lisa Hjulberg
• Lori Craig
• Melissa Sauls
• Monika Davis
• Rachel Sztonyk
• Rosie Hughes
• Sherrie Siemens
• Taylor Van Bruggen

Go to Taylor’s blog for all the info to play along with us!  Thanks for stopping by. I hope you have a great weekend!

Happy Thursday!  I’ve mentioned that Curt and I are dieting and excersing with weight loss goals in mind.  Well Curt hit a significant intermediate goal of losing 20 pounds!!!  I am so proud of him!  All of his pants and belts are way too big for him, but since he’s still losing weight we don’t want to invest in a lot of new clothes.  So I decided to take my Kohl’s coupon and buy him just a couple of things – a pair of Levi’s and a belt – to keep him going.  He started out in 40’s (and some 42’s).  The new jeans are 36’s and they fit perfectly – not even a smidge tight!  I am soooo proud of him and all the effort he is putting in – especially with all those bike rides.  Of course I wanted to make a card for him to go with the new jeans.

I haven’t played the SCS sketch challenge in while.  I always want to, but then never get to it.  When I saw the sketch this week (SC298) I just had to play with it!  I’m short on time this morning, but here are a few design notes:

stamps from Taylored Expressions –  In the park and Weigh to Go (also a random small alpha set for the numbers).  Inside I stamped the scale from Weigh to Go along with the sentiment “I am so proud of you!”

paper – Cosmo Cricket Togetherness 6×6 pad along with Wild Wasabi and Basic Black cardstock.  Image stamped on TE Choice Buttercream

other – image colored with Copic Atyou Spica Glitter pen and Sakura glaze pens.  Grass fringe was hand cut. Wasabi panel was embossed with a CB folder.  Spellbinders Labels 13 was used to die cut and mat the image. Black KaiserCraft pearls finish off the design.

 Most all the supplies can be found at TE.

Thanks for stopping by.

Happy Monday!  I’m pretty happy about it because I’ve lost 13.1 pounds in these last 9 weeks and I *just might* fit into the dress I’m hoping to wear to our niece’s wedding in a little less than a month PLUS I’m over 25% of the way to my overall weight loss goal!  Curt has lost 18 pounds and he’s back to bike riding again after being totally sidelined with his illness.  I’m super proud of both of us!

Speaking of the wedding…I attended a bridal shower for Kira on Saturday.  I was totally bummed that the gift I ordered from her registry didn’t arrive in time (it’s out for delivery with Mr. Brown TODAY, wouldn’t you know it!), but I had a little extra gift planned so I did have something to take with me.  For many years now I’ve made it a practice to include a set of handmade thank you notes with any bridal or baby shower gift I give.  After a shower there are always lots of thank you notes to write, so I know it is a gift that will be used and appreciated.  Kira loves dragonflies so I knew I wanted to use the TE set Discover Your Wings for her card set.  I found this adorable tin at Tuesday Morning for just $3.99.  Isn’t that wood handle sooooo cute?  It’s not quite the right height for standard sized cards, but I was able to fit a set of 12 with envelopes by having them lean back slightly. I might go back this week and see if they have any more because I think this would make a wonderful recipe tin!

Here’s a photo of 3 of the 12 the tent topper cards that are inside the tin. I made 4 of each color – Taken with Teal, Burgundy, Elegant Eggplant.

Cardbase is 4.25″ square made of kraft cardstock.  I stamped the floral silhouette image from the set in SU Crumb Cake ink (why oh why did they feel the need to change the name of kraft???) along the bottom of each cardbase.  Then I used craft ink (eggplant, burgundy, teal) to ink the edges of the cardbase.  The dragonflies were stamped in the same craft ink on TE Choice Buttercream cardstock and heat embossed with clear ep.  The images were cut with a circle nestie, edges were sponged with Crumb Cake,  and then matted on a Blossom nestie.  (Curt used my Big Shot to cut out the blossoms for me because I wasn’t feeling well when I made these and I was running out of time.  Isn’t that so sweet??? )

Sentiments (“grateful” and “thank you”) are from SU sets and were stamped in Brilliance chocolate ink.  Some vanilla taffeta ribbon finishes these off. {Tip: When putting ribbon toward the bottom of a card like this use a small piece of TE Sticky Tape under the ribbon on the inside of the card, so the ribbon doesn’t slip off.)

Here’s a photo of the card I made to coordinate with the tin.  I wanted to do something CAS with lots of white space.  I love this style, but it’s not particularly easy for me.  I was super happy with how this turned out!

Thanks for stopping by.  I hope you have a great week!  I’m looking forward to what I hope will be a very productive week – not a lot of commitments, so hopefully some time to catch up on some things I’ve been wanting/needing to accomplish for awhile that I just never seem to have time for.